This invention relates generally to automotive transmissions or the like. More particularly, it relates to a sliding gear manual transmission incorporating shift control guide and detent apparatus for precisely defining the gear shifting path and for developing detent forces when shifting in both the lateral and longitudinal planes.
In recent years there have been many improvements in the control of automotive transmissions, including improvements relating to the shifting of sliding gear manual transmissions. Some transmissions included a plurality of shift rails, one of which was selected and moved for corresponding selection and engagement of a desired speed ratio. Other transmissions included a single shift rail which was rotated for speed ratio selection and moved longitudinally for engagement of the selected ratio. Transmissions such as these usually provided some lockout mechanism for preventing engagement of ratios other than the one selected. This interlock mechanism was subject to binding.
Further, some transmissions included guide devices for guiding longitudinal rail movement. Other transmissions included detent devices for indicating longitudinal rail position. Such detents usually offered some resistance to longitudinal rail movement, thereby providing the vehicle operator with a sense of feel related to gear-engaging rail movement. These guide and detent devices generally required complex machined parts which were expensive to fabricate.
Thus, there remains a need in the art to provide simple and inexpensive means for precisely defining both the lateral selecting and longitudinal engaging movements of the shifting assembly within a manual transmission, for preventing interlock binding, and for detenting during both the selecting and engaging movements to provide desired operator feel.